Response to Walter Benjamin

"Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be" -Walter Benjamin This quote specifically made sense to me. Looking at art broadly, from paintings to architechture to literature, it seems to be the only direct thing that survives time and links us directly to the past. People die, and with them their stories and their knowledge. Society changes, languages fade out. It seems that art is only thing that we can hold in our hand or study personally and say, this artifact has been around since the middle ages. It was made by a person who lived then, and it presents to us directly what they valued in beauty and ideas. Art is the ultimate description of any culture. It reveals beliefs, priorities, social norms, physical means. Cultures have changed so immensly throughout time and place and the only way to study this kind history is through art. "We define the aura of the latter as the unique phenomenon of a distance, however close it may be. If, while resting on a summer afternoon, you follow with your eyes a mountain range on the horizon or a branch which casts its shadow over you, you experience the aura of those mountains, of that branch. " No doubt, I have experienced and loved experiencing auras. I recall waking up one morning and glancing out my window. It was spring, and a pink budded tree branched crossed the cloudless sky. It was so picturesque, so real. (As corny as it sounds...) That morning i recognized my appreciation for the auras in life, although I had known no name for it at the time. My inspirational morning was so lovely, that I wished to capture it. I whipped out my handy dandy camera and focused a lovely shot out my window. I knew though that it would not be developed with that aura. I got that picture developed and sighed at the camera's inability to reproduce my inspirational scene. The photograph was enough for me to look at it and be reminded of the feeling I had imersed in that aura, but if I had shown that picture to another person, it would mean absolutely nothing to them. But then that brings me to a question (I suppose the question I will use in class). Let's take DaVinci's Mona Lisa. Because of course Mona Lisa is probably used in every general art example ever... Do you think that DaVinci was disappointed with a lack of aura in his painting? Assuming he painted the portrait from a model, is it possible that he saw such an aura from that woman that compelled him to paint her, but can only be reminded of it when he looks at the painting, like me with my photograph? Then when he shows it to others, perhaps it means nothing to them compared to the reminder of some lovely feeling of DaVinci's alone? Then can we say that reproduction doesn't actually change any aura of the art, because the art is actually a reproduction of something else, and in being a reproduction, it has lost the aura already that the inspiration in real life had? I think art is a reproduction of life. Even if it is not a visual thing in life. It can be an emotion or an idea. Art reproduces life, in truth or lies, in detail or just generalization. Art reproduces culture, relationships, individuality. If art is a reproduction, than can reproducing art really have a negative effect on the original artwork? I'm not saying that I don't believe reproduction of art has a negative effect, in fact I really am not sure. But these are just ideas running through my head.